courageously upon them, and cut one with a sword on the buttock, and shot
another in the breast with an arrow. Astonished at the resolution of our
men, and terrified at the effect of our weapons, the Indians fled, leaving
most of their bows and arrows behind; and great numbers of them would
certainly have been killed, but the pilot of the caravel, who commanded
the boats crew, restrained our people from any farther vengeance. The
admiral was not at all displeased at this skirmish, as he imagined these
Indians were Caribs, so much dreaded by all the other natives of
Hispaniola; or at least, being a bold and resolute people, that they
bordered on that race; and he hoped that the islanders on hearing how
seven Spaniards had so easily defeated fifty-five fierce Indians, would
give the more honour and respect to our men who had been left at the
Nativity.

Afterwards about the evening, these people made a smoke as if in defiance;
but on sending a boat on shore to see what they wanted, they could not be
brought to venture near our people, and the boat returned. Their bows were
of a wood resembling yew, and almost as large and strong as those of
France and England; the arrows of small twigs which grow from the ends of
the canes, massive and very solid, about the length of a mans arm and a
half; the head is made of a small stick hardened in the fire, about
three-eighths of a yard long, tipped with a fishes tooth, or sharpened
bone, and smeared with poison. On this account, the admiral named the bay
in which he then was _Golpho de Flechas,_ or Gulf of arrows; the Indians
called it _Samana_. This place appeared to produce great quantities of
fine cotton, and the plant named _axi_ by the Indians, which is their
pepper and is very hot, some of which is long and others round[10]. Near
the land where the water was shallow, there grew large quantities of those
weeds which had formerly been seen in such abundance on the ocean; whence
it was concluded that it all grew near the land, and broke loose when ripe,